[Elecraft] W2 firmware anomaly

[Matt Moller]

Good afternoon all. Today I decided to dust of my W2 and put it back in 
service but had something odd happen after updating the firmware (from 
0.94 to 1.00) and was wondering if anyone else had seen this. The 
firmware load went fine and afterward everything was working great 
except for adjustment of the SWR alarm trip point. Sending the [ and ] 
commands with the W2 Utility always resulted in a response of [00; or 
]00; regardless of how many times they were sent. This happened whether 
or not the alarm function was enabled or a sensor was connected to the 
W2. I also tried powering it off then back on, restarting the W2 
utility, etc. with no changes. All other commands worked as expected. My 
computer (Windows 7) doesn't have a real serial port so I'm using the 
KUSB cable with FTDI chipset which has never given me any trouble.

I noticed that firmware v0.94 did not have this capability and I had 
never used the alarm function before anyhow. Maybe that had something to 
do with it? I finally thought that maybe a plug had to be in the 'REM' 
jack on the back of the unit for the alarm function to respond so I 
tried that. The first reponse was again [00; but after that it came back 
with [50; indicating it was set for 5.0 and it started working as it 
should. I was then able to vary the trip point up and down (from 1.2 to 
5.0) and get the response I expected. After that I tried removing the 
cable and it kept working, power cycling the unit (including turning off 
the power supply it was connected to) with and without the cable and it 
kept working. It seems to be fine now, so I'm not sure what I did or 
didn't do. I built the W2 from the "kit" if that matters, but it has 
always worked great excluding this. Thanks for your input.

Matt / KG6KSL